StarCraft II: Devils' Due (23 page)

man is what he chooses to be. It’s not how he’s born,

or how he’s raised, that makes the man. It’s his

choices. Right now, you’re choosing to walk this dark

path I can’t condone. But a man can turn his life

around with a single thought, a single decision. You

can always choose to be something new. Never

forget that.”

He eased back down, the effort clearly having

exhausted what little strength he had. His face was

pale and he was trembling, probably from pain. “I love

you, Son.”

The recording ended.

For a long moment Jim simply stood, breathing

hard, trying to process what he had just witnessed. He

took a steadying breath and turned to face his mother.

She sat where he had left her. The iced tea had

spil ed in her lap, the empty glass lying on the

upholstery beside her. Her face looked less drawn,

and her eyes were closed. There was a slight smile

on her lips.

“Mom,” Jim said, tears fil ing his eyes. He went to

her, gathered her in his arms, and sat with her for a

long, long time.

Myles knew what had happened the moment Jim

opened the door. The older man’s face fel , and he

seemed to be fighting back tears himself.

“Your mother’s gone,” he said quietly. Jim nodded.

“I’l take care of everything; don’t you worry. It’s a

blessing she hung on long enough to see you, and

that’s a fact, though it might have been sheer

stubbornness. She always knew you’d come home.

And with the pain she was in, and what she had to

look forward to as this Confederate-cursed disease

advanced … wel , it’s a blessing she’s with your father

now too.”

He squeezed Jim’s arm. Jim stared at him with

haunted eyes.

“A blessing,” he said in a hol ow voice. “Maybe

you’re right.”

The thought was a bitter one.

“You’d best be off. Leave the clothes in the truck; I’l

get them after dark. Right now I’m going to attend to

your mother. And, Jimmy … don’t forget what I said

about Mar Sara. You’d be right welcome there.”

Nearly an hour later, Jim Raynor sat in the

copilot’s seat of a system runner. He stared as the

ship lifted off, soaring upward. The brown earth

dropped away, becoming not fields as far as the eye

could see but merely patchworks the size of a hand.

He had worked those patches, had walked those

now-tiny streets. Had napped beneath trees that, from

this height, looked only as large as thumbnails. He

closed his eyes for a second, then focused on the

vessel’s control panel as he and Tychus flew up past

the clouds, into the atmosphere, and then among the

stars.

“You’re mighty quiet, Jimmy,” Tychus said.

Jim didn’t answer. His thoughts were elsewhere: in

his mind he was sitting in the living room with his

mother, watching the holovid of his dead father….

And wondering why the thought of a night with

Evangelina—complete with al the booze he could

drink—didn’t sound as appealing as it once had.

TARSONIS

The room was fil ed with the noises that never

ceased: the whooshing of Vanderspool’s forced

breathing, the whir of machinery, the click-click of the

elaborate machines that made bil ions of calculations

a minute. Other than that, it was silent.

The door opened. One of Vanderspool’s resocs

entered and approached the giant metal coffin.

“They’l be dead in two days.”

SKYWAY STARPORT, HALCYON

They met, far too early for either man’s taste, at

the Skyway Starport at 0600. Jim had tried to grab

some shut-eye at the hotel, making ful use of the

credits O’Banon had given them for lodging, but

Tychus looked as if he’d simply stayed up al night.

Jim was so tired he felt almost drunk, and Tychus

looked the same. It was not the optimal way to begin

an extremely important assignment.

They headed off in groggy silence in the attractive,

sleek little system runner that was waiting for them.

Once they had cleared the atmosphere of Halcyon,

Jim reached under the seat for the packet he had

been told would be there. He broke the seal, stifling a

yawn as he did so.

Tychus raised an eyebrow. “Mighty cloak-and-

dagger fancy,” he said.

“Yeah,” Jim said. In the packet were a smal , old-

fashioned key, falsified IDs, a notification that they

had outfits awaiting them in the back, and a data chip,

which he inserted into the ship’s drive.

Jim read through it quickly. His eyes widened; he

looked at the key and then summarized for the benefit

of Tychus, who was entering their route.

“Our heist … wel , half of it, anyway … is a person.

Who is apparently eagerly anticipating us.”

“What?”

“There is someone named Andrew Forrest. He’s …

a pharmacologist.”

Tychus snorted. “‘Hel o, Dr. Forrest, I need

something for this
pain in the ass
I’m experiencing.’

Why the hel are we picking up a pharmacologist? I

thought Scutter wanted us to steal something useful.

Like credits.”

Jim started to shake his head, then he figured it out.

“Drugs. O’Banon is also a drug runner.”

“Then steal the drugs, don’t steal the …” And then

Tychus figured it out too. “
Do
steal the guy who

created the drug! Scutter, I take it back: you are one

smart bastard.”

Jim nodded. “I’l bet you anything this Dr. Forrest is

one of a handful of people who know how to replicate

the formula for something that’s currently very popular

and very lucrative. He may even have been the one

who initiated the contact with Scutter.”

Neither, for al their myriad other vices, was heavily

into the il egal stuff. While they’d had the chance to

snort, swal ow, or smear on an impressive variety of

pharmaceuticals at various times over the years,

alcohol was stil their drug of choice. It was cheap and

easily obtainable in vast quantities, which was how

both of them liked it.

Tychus had once said that he didn’t want to be

beholden to anyone or anything—up to and including

women and addictive drugs. Jim just never saw the

appeal.

Too, the recent encounters with sicko Daun had

started to stir up memories they’d tried their best to

forget. It had been a long time since either of them

had thought about Lisa Cassidy, once known as

“Doc.” Doc had been hooked on a substance cal ed

crab. The despised Vanderspool had played on her

addiction in order to get her to betray not just Tychus,

whom she had hooked up with, but also the rest of

Heaven’s Devils. It had worked, too: eventual y she

had become a wil ing informant, with the lure of the

drug to keep her going. In the end, Doc had died of a

battle wound in front of Tychus, assuring him that her

deception “wasn’t personal.” Both Tychus and Jim

had known it wasn’t: there was nothing personal about

what a highly addictive drug could do to you, nor the

torment another human being could put you through

when you desperately needed the stuff.

“What do you think it is?” Jim wondered aloud. With

Doc in his mind, he couldn’t help but wonder if it was

crab. Almost at once, though, he dismissed the

thought. Crab was once hard to come by, but these

days it was becoming more and more common. No,

whatever O’Banon was after, it had to be something

out of the ordinary. Something rare, expensive,

upscale—and probably more addictive than anything

Jim had ever run across. That would be the only thing

that would make it worth O’Banon’s while.

“Don’t know, don’t care, just want my payment. Get

in, get the guy, get done in time to get drunk and poke

a pretty girl.”

The words and images they conjured up were

rough and tumble, crude, physical. Just what Jim

needed so he could stop thinking about Doc—and,

even closer to his heart, about Shiloh, and his mother,

and that damned holovid.

“I like this plan,” Jim said.

Halcyon was a fringe world that, right from its

colonization, had opened its arms to corporate

development, and probably half the big companies on

Tarsonis and other worlds had branches here. It was

a pleasant world: not quite nice enough to be a

vacation destination but the sort of place where

hardworking businessmen could be provided with fine

facilities, earn excel ent pay, and have decent places

to raise the kids. The research and development

branch of Besske-Vrain & Stalz Pharmaceutical

Corporation looked like any other building on a fairly

wel -established fringe world. It was large and

comfortably sprawling, with neatly manicured lawns

and benches and fountains scattered here and there.

The whole was encased in state-of-the-art security

designed to be as unobtrusive as it was efficient. If

you didn’t know where to look and what to look for,

you would miss the cameras, the heat sensors, the

motion detectors, and the approximately sixteen other

devices being employed. Jim and Tychus would have

needed a security systems expert if they had had to

break in.

Fortunately, they did not have to do it the hard way.

They had badges proclaiming their identities. Jim

was now a high-ranking faculty member of the

Tarsonis University, City of Tarsonis campus. Tychus

was the point man for an organization cal ed

Physicians for Results Now. According to the

literature, the organization wanted to cut through the

red tape to get “results now” for patients who were in

the latter stages of diseases. In other words, they

advocated legalizing and distributing medications that

perhaps hadn’t been tested enough to be proven

safe.

“Yeah, I can see you pushing for results right now,

damn it.” Jim laughed.

“Can’t see
you
as a doctor, though,” Tychus shot

back.

Their clearance level was extremely high. It would

permit them access to the laboratory, private offices,

and, as a special bonus, the executive bathroom.

They were greeted in the cavernous lobby by a

meticulously wel -groomed, bright-eyed young man

who introduced himself as Jason Richfield. He

seemed a touch suspicious of Tychus—probably

because of the man’s size and roughed-up

appearance, even with a shower and haircut—but

after checking out their clearance levels, he ushered

them in graciously.

“I’l let Dr. Forrest know you’re here,” he said. Jim

and Tychus waited patiently while listening to generic,

non-threatening music piped in from somewhere, their

large frames nearly swal owed by comfortable

upholstery, until said Dr. Forrest appeared.

“Gentlemen, welcome to the research and

development branch of Besske-Vrain & Stalz,”

Forrest said, smiling and extending a hand. He was in

his later middle years, tanned, healthy-looking, and

graying in a most distinguished manner. He had a

firm handshake, soft, wel -manicured hands, a crisp

white coat, and a fine chin. Jim disliked him

immediately. He couldn’t put his finger on it. Maybe

the handshake was too practiced, the voice too wel

modulated.

Or maybe it was because Forrest was going to

come work for a man who’d pay him mil ions to get

people hooked on something that would in al

probability turn them into desperate slaves.

Jim knew it was not his place to pass judgment. But

somehow everything had felt cleaner when he was

robbing trains and stealing Confederate credits.

“Let me give you a tour of the lab area first, then we

can break for lunch and attend the meeting at 1400,”

he said. “You’l like our cafeteria: our chef used to

work for one of the top restaurants on Tarsonis. The

food’s both delicious and nutritious—not a mean

feat!”

Jim and Tychus smiled and nodded, fol owing him

down the marble-floored corridor as they went to the

elevators. The two took their cue from the scientist

and chatted about inanities while they were in the

elevator. So calm and unruffled was Forrest that Jim